The first time I played Katamari Damacy was with Reroll in 2018. I had gotten a copy for Christmas after thinking it seemed interesting. I played it a bit throughout my week trip with my ex-girlfriend and thought it was somewhat fun and nothing else. Fast forward to 2022, I was going through my games deciding what to play next. I see Reroll and remembered I didn't actually beat it. Since I knew it was short, I decided to finish it this time. Coming out of it, I thought it was great and a lot better than I initially thought. Fast forward again to the end of 2022, I get the PS2 version. I already really enjoyed Reroll but this replay of the OG version made me truly love Katamari and got me to eventually play We Love Katamari. And yet again, with this most recent playthrough, I still love this game.

The story of Damacy is wacky and lighthearted. The King of Cosmos (this giant flying handsome guy like fella) flies into all the stars in the sky as well as the moon because he was drunk. You the prince, must now roll up objects in levels and create new stars (and the moon) to fix your dad's mistake. That's the entire story but it works because of this games weird and quirky humor.

So you have to roll up objects in levels and make them big enough to satisfy the king before he turns them into stars. Sounds simple enough right? Well besides there being some levels that aren't just that, the way you collect objects in this game is interesting. You start with a ball at a specific size and must gradually make it bigger over time. The thing with that is, you can't roll just anything at the start. You have a size limit depending on how large your ball is and as it gets bigger, so does the size of possible things you can roll up. It can be a bit tricky to gauge what things you can and can't collect at your ball size, and if you run into something you can't it can knock things out of your ball. It's actually not too hard to do that, because along with knocking into large objects, if you get stuck somehow that can make you drop objects as well. It's actually not hard to get stuck in this game, and while it can be somewhat frustrating, you can usually escape. A large part of the reason this game is so fun to play, besides the general gameplay being solid, is how wacky collecting everything is. What you can collect ranges from small stuff like erasers or thumbtacks to literal whole landmasses and clouds in the sky. Besides the King occasionally cracking jokes or reprimanding you in levels, a lot of the character comes the humans. Like halfway into the game, you start getting to levels where you can collect humans. There are all types of them and they all have hilarious or even somewhat-terrifying reactions to being rolled up. But this is the fun of the game, going from level to level and seeing what types of craziness will ensue.

Something I think I prefer in We Love are the level settings. In this game it's a lot more basic and is someone's home, a little town, an area by a lake and then a whole city. It's not bad in the slightest, and I do really like how the levels evolve over the time..I just prefer We Love's more varied level themes now. I will say though, while I do at the very least like every level, the final one where you must make the moon is so peak. It's a city level but you're given 25 minutes to complete it and you eventually get big enough to collect full cities and clouds in the sky and a literal thunder god. It's insane and by far the wackiest level in the game and I love it. I gave a couple very minor things I wish were better in this game but the thing I actually don't like are some of the side levels. Besides the usual ones I described, there are levels where you must create constellations. These range from levels where you have to collect as many of an object as you can to one where you must collect as many paired objects as you can. These are all fine and dandy but then there are some where you have to collect the biggest of an object you can. These two levels are make Ursa Major and Make Taurus. With these, you have to collect the biggest bear and cow in each respective level. Only issue is there are bears and cows all over the level and if you collect just one it ends the level. They want you to memorize the stage so you can make your ball big enough and find the bear/cow. Idk, I never had the patience for these and just don't find them fun so I always just collect the first one I see and skip it basically. Another level I'm not as keen on but still try with is the one where you must make a 10M ball but you can't see your progress so you must guess. I do find it a little fun to see how close I can get but it's pretty difficult for me to gauge where I'm at just by guessing. That's my biggest issue with the game, these three side levels and they're only like a 10th of the game so it's not the biggest deal in the world.

The games visuals and artstyle is fantastic. It goes for cel-shading I believe and it makes every level so vibrant and colorful. The levels are already cool enough as it is but the little planets you go on in the hub, atmospherically are great as well. It's literally just your means of going to each level or the options in the game but it has a ton of personality that just makes it super memorable. The entire game is like that tbh, even the title screen with the three game files has you rolling up parts of the word Namco to start..each file in the game is literally a couple letters of the publisher! It's just incredibly quirky and charming which I love a lot.

Besides the game's weird and quirky nature, the soundtrack is kind of what sells this game. It's honestly a very impressive and out there OST, with songs from all different music genres. You have swing, techno, salsa, J-pop etc. This game is bound to have a song you'll like. Some of my favorites are Que Sera Sera, Katamari on the Rocks, Lovely Angel and plenty more. There are actually a couple of stage songs I'm not like a huge fan on, namely Wanda Wanda and You Am Smart. They aren't bad, they just pale in comparison to a lot of the other songs I feel. I honestly don't think I like love love any song in this game, but like the collective majority of great and experimental songs just makes me appreciate the soundtrack a ton. That is...besides Lonely Rolling Star which is not only my favorite song between both Katamari games I've played, it's one of my favorite videogame songs ever now and is probably in my top 5 VGM of all time. The levels it's in could be total shit and I wouldn't care because the song is so good, so every level it was in (only 2 apparently which is kinda sadge) was pure bliss. The final level was also pure bliss because on top of being the most fun, it played Katamari on the Rocks which is a banger. Either way, great OST which is even more peak because it has Lonely Rolling Star.

Had a couple of little gripes that might be fixed by We Love when I replay it. Doesn't change the fact this game is peak though. Was thinking about bumping this to a 10, still might in the future, but for now I'll just keep it at a 9. Still a blast to play and just artistically it's amazing (both conceptually and it's music/art style) which I appreciate a TON. Anyways, next review will be Majora's Mask and then I'll probably join everyone in playing Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance so look forward to those reviews in the future!

Ocarina of Time was my first game in the Zelda franchise. Not this version tho, Ocarina of Time 3D. I won't get into the details with that version, but I very much enjoyed it and wanted to play other games in the series. The same year, or the year after, my one uncle gave me his N64. I'm pretty sure there was only two games that came with it. Star Wars: Episode 1 - Racer and this game. Barely touched Star Wars at but OOT, well I already really enjoyed the 3D remake so I was excited to actually give the original a try. I loved it. At least I'm assuming I did, for some reason I replayed this version so many times back in the day..it became my most replayed game ever for a while. I memorized the entire game, every major bombable hole location, every gold skulltula. I don't know why I played this game so much but I think I ended up overplaying it to the point I started not loving it as much. With this Zelda marathon, I was able to replay this once again after not replaying it in like 10 years. Even now, I still felt some of those overplayed woes I had back then, but mostly in the early game. Even now, 90% of the collectables came right back to me. Even now, it was still fun playing this game and I still love it for getting me into Zelda and into other Nintendo games in general. This game is not perfect, and I do have some criticisms for sure, but this is an important game in regard to the history of gaming and an important game to me.

One of the best aspects of this game is its story and world-building in comparison to past games. The main plot is actually pretty similar to ALTTP. You are tasked with collecting 3 Spiritual Stones (pendants), have to obtain the Master Sword in the Temple of Time (the Lost Woods) and then you must awaken the seven sages (seven maidens) so you can destroy the barrier in Ganondorf's castle and defeat him. Very similar to ALTTP, except instead of traveling between the Light and Dark world, you must travel between the present and future. See, you actually start as young link but when you obtain the Master Sword, Link is sealed in it for seven years and becomes an adult. In terms of the story, this is much more interesting than the light and dark world was. The world changes around you as you travel to the future, and so do the characters. Speaking of them, this game is chalk full of em and they're way more interesting this time around. Link himself has way more personality than he ever did in past games. I still definitely prefer future iterations of him but he's solid here. Zelda is MUCH better here and actually plays a big part in the story. She has way more scenes and due to that and her Shiek persona, she's absolutely one of the best if not the best character in the game. Ganondorf is actually seen with his non-pig design here and there's a reason this game made his human form iconic. The sages, unlike the unnamed maidens, are actual characters here. Not just throughout their temples, you meet pretty much all of them as young Link throughout Hyrule and you help them out along the way. This helps in making them memorable and let me tell you they very much are. Whether it's your childhood friend Saria to the rough and tough Goron Darunia, they're all pretty different characters and again are actually characters this time around. The little side characters you meet in each location are memorable to as the dialogue they are given is translated much better. ALTTP I found to a decently plain and straight-forward English translation. Here tho, they like to be quirky and make a lot of the side characters say weird and interesting things which helps the world feel alive. Something else that makes the game feel alive is the many races that are found in this world. ALTTP had Hylians and Zora. Not only does OOT have those (and they're more fleshed out) it added Kokiri, Shiekah, Gerudo, Deku, and Goron's. All of these helps add to the world-building immensely. Something that would make the dialogue better in this version of the game is if you could skip to the end of single textboxes. You either have to read each one slowly or if you try to make it go faster, it skips to the very end of a set of textboxes. Majora's Mask fixed this and so did the 3DS remake, but I thought it was worth pointing out here because it can be a tad bit irksome.

The combat in this game is very different from ALTTP, simply because it's 3D now instead of 2D. This game introduces Z-Targeting. When you hold the Z button in front of an enemy, you will automatically target and face their direction the entire time. This is incredibly helpful and is almost needed with a game like this. Because this game is in 3D, this changes Link's moveset dramatically. You still swing your sword but now depending on your button inputs, you'll do different swings. You can do a vertical, horizontal swing and a jab. If you z target, have your sword out and press the a button, you do a jump attack. You can backflips, you can do side jumps. Link now auto-jumps whenever you go off a platform or a ledge. Just your basic move set is fun and imo more fun than 2D Zelda. This isn't even getting into other items like the hook-shot which had an amazing transition into 3D. That and the bow puts you into first person and it just works marvelously. The slingshot and boomerang puts you into like a over the shoulder third person view. Funnily enough, each set of items I mentioned are exclusive to each form of Link. Young Link can only use certain items and vice versa for Adult Link. Along with the enemies being more fun and interesting in a 3D environment, the combat in this game was improved from past games and it's honestly amazing for a game from 1998 and amazing for Zelda's first foray into 3D.

The overworld honestly is not the best, I think. It was their first 3D game, I'll cut them some slack but I don't care for Hyrule Field. The size was most certainly impressive back in the day, however now I just see it as wasted potential. It's pretty empty, not very interesting to look at and it's "secrets" are lame. Basically any secrets it has are holes under boulders or completely invisible holes you bomb to unlock. You can find these with the stone of agony but you need a rumble pak to even use it. Otherwise, you either have to randomly guess where they are like Zelda 1 or memorize where they, are after looking them up, on future playthroughs like I did. Wouldn't be much of an issue if some of them didn't have important stuff like gold skulltulas or a heart piece. Outside of that, you have a tedious big poe quest and a single NPC that's used in quest. Honestly if the secrets were just a little better, it was more visually appealing and there were a couple more NPC's, this main overworld, that's connected to every area, would be so much better to me. Honestly I feel like Majora's Mask fixed this issue with Termina Field, which is way better imo, but as it stands this is my least favorite part of the game imo. The area's connected to Hyrule Field are good however, Visually distinct and they have plenty of actually good secrets and collectables to find. However, actual side quests in this game aren't too great imo. The Biggoron one is memorable, but all the others aren't too great imo and are very much overshadowed by Majora Mask's fantastic side quests. Like there's literally a mask side quest where you have to obtain masks and sell them to NPC's. The reward isn't great, another mask, and it just reminds me of how MM handled its mask items way better. Tho alas, I should not be comparing it to a future game like that so I will stop.

My least favorite part of them game, besides Hyrule field, is young Link's portion. Don't get me wrong, it's not bad but the dungeons you go through don't compare to Adult Link's Temples. The Great Deku tree is a solid starting dungeon but it's also very simple. Same with Dodongo's Cavern and Jabu-Jabu's Belly. None of them are bad, they're just very simple compared to temples. Something that is great tho, and this applies to every dungeon in the game, is how visually distinct and memorable they are. 2D Zelda dungeons are great and all but they just don't compare to 3D ones. The type of stuff you can do in 3D dungeons can't be replicated in 2D ones. Jumping from the top of a tree and feeling the full depth of your fall as you land on a spider-web and bust through it due to gravity. Just can't work in 2D. I can see why people might prefer 2D ones tho. As long as they're well designed, they're usually more complicated and technically better "dungeons" where its easy to get lost. However, they lack the spectacle that I prefer in 3D ones. The first 3 young Link dungeons are very linear for example. They have puzzles ofc but it's hard to get lost in them unlike 2D ones. However, I don't mind that (tho in these first 3 dungeons case I guess I do cuz they're a bit TOO simple) and that's proven by the five temples in this game. Adult Link temples, while still probably more linear than some 2D Zelda dungeons, rock my socks. I'll just get into this now, Water temple is not bad. It was my least favorite temple this playthrough, but it's not bad..just can be a little tedious. It's the most complex and backtracky dungeon in the game, and feels kinda like a 2D dungeon but that's at the cost of being a little more tedious than the others (not only due to the design of the place but the iron boots ofc). It can be tough to figure out but I can apprecauet that. Fire temple is also good but just doesn't stick out as much as the other three. Shadow has a very disturbing atmosphere and relies on tricks and traps. Forest and Spirit temple are easily the best dungeons in the game. Forest is very atmospheric and is a very nicely designed dungeon with a great temple theme. Spirit temple is the only one to make use of both young and adult Link, and it does it well, as well as having the best dungeon boss in the game. Not every dungeon in this game is like amazing, but when it hits..IT HITS. Oh also the dungeon bosses vary in quality. Twinrova is the best boss in the game I think. She makes great use of the mirror shield and the witch sisters have actual dialogue and are actual characters that make the boss that much better. Phantom Ganon is cool as well and Ganondorf/Ganon himself is ofc badass. There are some weaker bosses like King Dodongo being piss easy or Morpha being very easy to cheese, however even these weaker bosses are cool to see now that the games in 3D.

Quick thing on the visuals. They don't look bad but they can be a bit ugly at times. Obviously, this is a game from 1998, so I can let it slide somewhat. I played on an actual N64 so the resolution and framerate are pretty bad. They had to be to even run this game at the time, so with knowledge of that and how the game looks its impressive. Still, I know I'd say I wouldn't compare it to Majora's Mask again...but that game is on the same system and looks way more vibrant to me. I know it's using the expansion pass but still..

The soundtrack is absolutely iconic. ALTTP is where Zelda's Lullaby originated, howevrr this version is way more iconic to me. Same with Kakariko Village tho I honestly might like ALTTP's version of it hehe. As for original songs, Lost Woods, Song of Storms, Gerudo Valley, Lon Lon Ranch are all bangers and are super duper iconic for good reasons. The Ocarina songs are all really good, and I actually like how the Ocarina plays a much bigger part in this game compared to the last two games it was in. My absolute favorite song in the game funnily enough, is Requiem of Spirit. Always has been, always will be. Something about it is kinda eerie yet mysterious. It's such a short song yet it's my favorite, idk why lol.

I was honestly very conflicted while playing this. Due to my complaints with Hyrule field/sidequests and me overplaying this game back in the day, part of me wanted to keep this at an 8. However, this game really was important in expanding my taste in games and is just an important landmark of a game in general. What really pushed me to bump it to a 9 though, was the ending. I've already seen it before, but I teared up. Not just teared up, I actually started to cry a bit. I don't know if it's just because the ending is very sweet and emotional, or because it reminded me the days I'd used to play this game a ton (insert anology of how I longed for my days of being a child just like Adult Link does at the end of the game or something idk). Either way, yeah I'll bump it to a 9. Game's not perfect but it is awesome, that's all that needs to be said.

I'm going to play Katamari Damacy after this and then move on to my personal favorite Zelda, Majora's Mask. Look forward to those reviews in the near future!

This is the start of a series of reviews that I’ve titled “The Great Zelda Binge”, where I’ll be reviewing all of the single player mainline entries in The Legend of Zelda series, as well as their various ports. The Legend of Zelda is my favorite video game franchise. It’s that childhood game series that remains near and dear to my heart to this day, and is immensely responsible for my love of the medium in general. Writing in-depth reviews on each mainline entry in the series is my way of paying tribute to it, as well as finally forcing myself to catch up on a couple of stray titles in the series that I just haven’t gotten to yet. Some friends of mine, Reyn, Quent, Steinco, and PT are also doing similar Zelda marathons, and I highly recommend giving their reviews a look as well.

All that being said, despite my proclaimed love for the franchise, I will admit: coming to appreciate its very first game is rather difficult. The original Legend of Zelda lays down an enormous amount of groundwork for the series. It is more or less the template that the vast majority of games in the series would follow going forward. Despite being a strong foundation to build upon, ultimately, that’s all the first Zelda is: a foundation. It’s a primitive game that understandably has numerous issues that end up being addressed in future entries of the series.

Ages ago, the kingdom of Hyrule was in possession of the “Triforces”, which were golden triangle-shaped objects imbued with mystic power. The Prince of Darkness, Ganon, led an army of monsters to attack Hyrule in order to seize the Triforces and wield their awesome abilities for himself, so he could plunge the world into darkness and rule over it all. After he acquired the Triforce of Power, the princess of Hyrule, Zelda, split the Triforce of Wisdom into eight separate pieces and hid them throughout the kingdom in order to keep Ganon from obtaining it, while sending her attendant, Impa, to seek out someone with the courage to defeat Ganon. After learning about what the princess had done, Ganon imprisoned Zelda and sent his monsters to track down Impa, who at the last minute, was saved by a young man named Link. After Impa tells Link about everything that’s happened, Link’s sense of justice causes him to resolve to find the eight pieces of the Triforce of Wisdom, rescue Zelda, and stop Ganon’s plans to take over the world.

The Legend of Zelda is a game that’s meant to recreate a traditional fantasy adventure. It’s a top-down, action-adventure game rooted in the concept of exploration, of going out into the world and uncovering all sorts of secrets and battling evil monsters during your quest to rescue the princess. The game starts Link off in the Overworld, which is where you’ll spend a majority of your time traversing. After obtaining the wooden sword from the cave on the starting screen, you set out into the world. There’s a lot you will find throughout the land of Hyrule. You can discover special items that Link can use either in combat or while exploring, such as the boomerang, which can stun enemies, or the bombs, whose explosions can damage enemies and reveal hidden caves and pathways. There are hordes of monsters that you encounter, as well as various caves with merchants you can purchase items from, and even secret individuals who will grant you a reward for finding them. Despite the game’s ethos being rooted in exploration and discovery, its biggest problem is that it’s designed in a way that doesn’t make exploration enjoyable at all. In fact, blindly exploring in this game is downright painful. The Overworld in particular is absolutely miserable to traverse if you don’t know where to go or what to do.

Almost every screen in the Overworld is overrun by all sorts of different monsters, and I do mean overrun. You can’t go a single screen in any direction without a mob of enemies immediately spawning in and hurling projectiles at you. At the start of the game, Link is particularly fragile, it doesn’t take more than a couple of hits for him to go down. Dying causes Link to respawn with only three hearts at the starting screen with the cave where you find the sword, and while you can obtain items and upgrades that will make Link live longer, I can’t imagine most people figuring out how to find them on their own.

I will be completely up front: I used a guide for the Overworld sections of the game, and if you plan on trying this out for yourself, I highly recommend you do the same. The particular guide I used, which was found on zeldadungeon.net, specifically has you go out and obtain a number of items and upgrades as the very first thing you do in the game. It’s very understandable why the guide has you get them. A couple of these items, specifically the Heart Containers and the Blue Ring, are particularly important to get as early as possible if you want to keep yourself from dying to a single touch, as they give Link additional health and lessen the amount of damage he takes from enemies respectively.

This ties into what I believe to be the biggest issue of the game. A number of these special items and upgrades are located or tied to secrets you can find throughout the Overworld. These secrets include hidden merchants who you can buy items from, old men who will give you additional Heart Containers, and the occasional friendly monster who will pay you an amount of rupees (the currency of The Legend of Zelda series) for discovering them, which you would otherwise have to collect by grinding enemies. While you could consider the game’s secrets to be optional, as it is possible to beat the game without them, choosing not to seek them out will make things much harder for you. The problem is that the game’s secrets are hidden in an extremely poor fashion. They will usually be hidden in caves that you have to discover by bombing specific walls, or underneath bushes that you have to burn using the Candle item. However, you have absolutely no way of telling what wall can be bombed or what bush can be burned. When it comes to bombs, you can only carry a limited supply, and the Candle can only be used once per screen. Unless you want to go through the utterly insane process of bombing every single wall you see, or burning a single bush, leaving the current screen and then returning to burn another one, then you will not find these (in my opinion) highly necessary upgrades.

The pieces of the Triforce are all located in places known as labyrinths, which are underground maze-like locations filled with traps and enemies. Labyrinths are where you’ll find a majority of special items in the game, as each labyrinth has at least one item for you to find. The end of each labyrinth features a showdown with a boss guarding a piece of the Triforce. Upon defeating it, Link will earn a Heart Container and he’ll also be able to collect the Triforce piece the boss is guarding. After completing all eight labyrinths and gathering all eight Triforce pieces, Link can then set out in search of the final labyrinth in Death Mountain, where Ganon and the Princess reside.

The labyrinths are relatively simple to explore compared to the Overworld. They typically consist of various rooms where you just fight enemies on your way to find the dungeon's key item and then the boss. You’ll occasionally need to push a random block in a room in order to unlock a stairway to a hidden passage as well. About halfway through the game, however, labyrinths do require you to bomb specific walls in order to progress, and you run into the same issue that you have with the Overworld: you have no way of knowing what walls to bomb, which can cause you to waste them. If you’re not using a guide during the labyrinths and you’re playing the game either via an emulator or on Nintendo Switch Online, you’re going to want to use the rewind feature very often just to make sure that you don’t waste bombs trying to figure out where to go.

Labyrinths are also where you’ll be doing the most combat as well. Combat in this game, despite being simple at heart, does get more complex than you’d expect. You can only thrust your sword in the direction that Link is currently facing, meaning you have to frequently move and position yourself according to the enemy’s moving patterns so that you can hit them without getting hit yourself. Certain enemies can only be attacked at certain angles, though as you progress through the game and get more upgrades, you can just start to tank hits from weaker enemies and mash your sword, which is admittedly rather lazy and does make the combat less engaging than it would otherwise be.

Its presentation is about what you’d expect for the NES. Its visual style is simple, yet iconic all the same. It makes great use of the NES’ color palette to simulate various climates that you explore, such as green forest areas, brown mountain areas and deserts, and blue lakes and rivers. It’s only got about five music tracks, but again, it's some of the most iconic music in all of video games. The main theme in particular is up there with Super Mario Bros’ overworld theme as one of the most well known video game songs of all time. Koji Kondo made do with what he had to work with, and he did a damn good job, he truly understood the assignment.

The Legend of Zelda, despite not quite earning my enjoyment, still earns my respect at the bare minimum. Technically, almost everything that I would come to love about the series is here, but what’s here is rather unrefined. It’s a game that I’m happy to have completed for the sole purpose of being able to say “I beat Zelda 1”, but otherwise, it’s not really a game I can recommend to people nowadays unless you are adamant about experiencing Zelda’s roots. It doesn’t accomplish its goal of providing an enjoyable exploration-based experience primarily because of the way its upgrades and certain items are distributed and hidden, but the building blocks for future Zelda titles are there. The series wouldn’t be around without it, and plenty of other games wouldn’t be around without it either. It’s a necessary first step on the path to something far greater.

This game feels like it was made by Yuji Naka. Do not ask me to elaborate, just know that I mean that in the most derogatory way possible.

I love the creativity of the game, and even though this isn't the first time Nintendo has done the whole it's-all-a-play thing, it still works and is pretty cool especially when it all comes together in sequences like the cowgirl chases. That's where my praise ends, because Princess Peach: Showtime! is one of the blandest Nintendo releases in recent memory. Frustratingly simple gameplay, mediocre visuals, atrocious performance, unremarkable music, character designs that look like they were ripped right out of Balan Wonderworld…the list just goes on. I don’t understand what went wrong here.

This was a complete and utter flop for me.